Woo, una abogada extraordinaria (2022)

Representation matters. More Autism, more minorities, this is a good direction for k-drama's to be going.
Character development happening for some support roles.. at the last few episodes, wasn't super fond of that. Story was so slow but got so rushed, that matched with the timing of certain character developments marks it down for us. A personal gripe of mine is hiring actual Autistic folk to play the roles (Which can be done, and has been done in other movies and series.) A decent K-drama overall. Cute, good chemistry with the cast, great whale facts, and even with dark themes it always returned to a light-hearted day-to-day.

I would also really like meat noodles now.

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Well played main character

plot - autistic woman becomes attorney and joins attorney firm.

This drama takes me back to 90's and 2000's when was popular episodic criminal series.
This drama got 16 ep and it practically means 16 different criminal cases to solve by our autistic Attorney.
In background you get some stories about her colleagues at firm + her own romance story.

But what truly made this drama to peak drama was acting of main female lead. Not sure if its well played autism, but for sure you can feel and believe that main female lead is different from others normal population.

Genre - Law, Romance, Life, Drama
9/10 peak drama at least for me/ possibility for second series, but first series is still well ended

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A fun enjoyable ride with a bunch of unique characters

I am always intrigued and delighted to watch media that represents minorities especially mentally or intelectually challenged individuals. It goes without saying that their representation has been for long on the rare side, and sometimes their depiction felt inaccurate (with excpetions of course), but lately the world and societal norms have shifted in a way that is opening more doors, breaking down more walls and becoming more and more accepting and open-minded to discussing such topics on a deeper level, addressing not only what it means to have mental or intellectual disabilities, but also showing how society can sometimes be ill-equipped to deal with such indiviuals in a way that ensures they are not left out or marginalized, but alas on the contrary in many cases breed inequality against them.

Autism Spectrum in particular is one mental disorder that should definitely be receiving more coverage, and I find that sometimes lighter content media could be the key to spreading a quick and helpful awareness and understanding among the public, because not everyone is ready to read a book or watch a scientific documentary, but who doesn't like to learn about different people in a light and enjoyable story settin, whether it be fictional or inspired by true events.

Saying that Extraordinary Attorney Woo was a fun ride would be an understatement, I nearly binge watched the whole series in under 2 days which might have been a normal achievement for me a couple of years ago, but now as a mother of two it has become quite the impossible feat. The drama uses a one-case-per-episode format, and I loved how there was a wide and varying range of cases, each showing different characters, and at the same time discussing a different topic that concerns the Korean society in an interesting and thought-enducing way. I also appreciated how they accurately depicted what it means to be a lawyer, especially one who works under a big law firm, the agony of being torn between the interests of your client and your conscience, and also sometimes how one can sometimes win and other times lose, but also how sometimes you can win on paper but feel like you lost and vice versa.

As for the characters, the main female lead was simply put the cake, the icing and the cherry. The actress' performance was superb. I might have had some minor grievances with the writing of the character, in that she would at times be extra social awkward, unable to read between the lines, or interpret people's expressions or metaphors, but other instances she would be very normally intuitive and able to infer people's feelings just like a non-autistic person. I know that there is a wide range of autistim (a point that is thankfully discussed in the drama) and that people can grow and mature overtime and experience, but it felt here like she rhe degree of awkwardness was shiting up and down according to the needs of the situation.

The main male lead, I honestly find difficutly referring to him as that. Although he is a main character and the romantic interest of the FL, and I liked the actor a lot and found his performance was great, I thought that the writing was greatly unfair to him. Among all the other members of the Hanbada team that we became acquainted to, he was the one that really needed the most fleshing out, but despite that he somehow felt like a side character that just appeared every now and then to provide a romantic plot line, his character felt too much two-diemntional for a ML, in that we never know anything about HIM, im essence who he is, for me at least there were a lot of questions filling my head concerning him varying from the deep to the simple ( like how he came to share an appartment with att. Knon for instance), and I kept holding out for an episode that would venture into his character background story deeper, but it never came, and these feelings that I couldn't seem to shake off that his depiction was shallow, only made me question what made him develop romantic feelings towards our FL in the first place. I am not saying that there was no chemistry, on the contrary I find both actors delivered a performance that left butterflies in ones stomach, a smile or a tear sometimes, and I totally cared for them and cheered them on, but that was all thanks to the actors and the dialog, but the writing on the other hand focused more on the law aspect of the story with the romance plot sometimes falling to the curbside. Don't get me wrong, I loved the romance here, but I could have been more moved and it could have left a deeper impression on me if there had been more light shed on the male lead, and the couple's journey given more screen time overall.

I've discussed too much in the character and writing aspect, but I will just say that I really loved all the members of the Hanbada team, but above all I especially LOVED attorney Jung, whose presence in any scene simply lighted up my screen. He was the perfect mentor to our rookies, he was competent, honest, tolerant, kind, humble, but above all humanely flawed in such a way he was one of the most believable and endearing characters in the whole series.

The direction was overall great, with nice camera work, but I sometimes hated the transition between the scenes, especially shifting from a personal situation to a courtroom setting, sometimes it just felt too sudden and sharp to the point I was surprised and distracted. I am not here referring to the instances where attorney Woo's autistic tendencies drove her to take a sudden and extreme shift in her thoughts which happened constantly, that was believable and necessary for an accurate depiction of an autistic person, I am rather talking about scene editing, or maybe it is a problem with the screenplay i honestly dunno because I don't have enough knowledge about these things, but it just felt like I was reading a comic book with a character mid-sentence, only to turn the page and find the next frame showing a whole different situation.

The music, nothing major stuck to my head but overall it suited the feel of the story and the atmosphere of the drama.

Rewatch value, this one's high, maybe not immediately but I think that later on, there a lot of scenes and interactions that could be enjoyable to experience once more, and maybe rewatching such a drama might help one ponder and reflect more about certain topics.

Overall, I would definitely recommend this drama. It is hard to be confident about how accurate the depiction of a person with disability was achieved, especially when it comes to autism which is a whole wide spectrum, but I can say that I personally felt it was believable and overall accurate.

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Incrível

Ah! Não consigo acreditar que esta obra não tenha sido classificada como "Perfeita", é maravilhosa! A história, a trilha (eu de novo com minhas trilhas), é meu toque de celular! Eu não sei em outros países, mas no Brasil, separamos vida pessoal do artista e o personagem que ele interpreta, temos artistas fantásticos que a vida é a vida de um ser humano normal, e assim deve ser! Eles são humanos, não vivem 24 horas no personagem, a não ser que estejam loucos. Sejamos empáticos e nos coloquemos no lugar deles, isso ninguém quer se dar ao trabalho de fazer, é triste demais, é exigir demais e se o fizessem contigo como você reagiria? Ia doer muito... Apaixonada por essa série fofa, linda, cativante e acima de tudo, tratando de assunto sério de maneira graciosa, o espectro autista, que hoje encontramos em tantas crianças e adultos em níveis variados de dificuldades. Sejamos amáveis gente!

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GOOD AUTISM REP!!!

I didn't rlly expected any in this shit! BUT DAMN I"M GLAD I STUCK AROUND!!!

The story, the romance, the representation, the acting, !!!

I was kinda scared on how they would portray autism, since sterotypes, but they did potray it how it should be potrayed. It wasn't forced, stereotypical, or cringe. \

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The perfect combination of education, entertainment and romance

This is one of the best dramas I've watched. And I think this is only one of the few I don't have anything negative to say about it. I loved the characters, even the "bad" ones, the story is great at combining the events of the cases, Youngwoo's and Junho's relationship and her autism. All the cases were entertaining and intriguing. The relationship of Youngwoo and Junho was so pure and genuine, the actors did an amazing job. I love how it never felt like the writers were treating autism with a prejudice mind; I felt like they really wanted to created a piece of work that was true to real life experiences.

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The good and the bad, but mostly good!

Honestly, I really liked this drama!

My biggest problem with it was probably the pacing. The pacing near the end was really off because the big issue the drama had built up was resolved quite abruptly, not to mention we never learn of Hanbada's CEO's issue with Tae Su-mi lol. Like WHY? What's the hate about? I also don't really understand Jun-ho's existence. He wasn't really a big part of the drama despite being the male lead interest, which maybe was the point? But you'd expect him to really help with Young-woo's character development which didn't really happen. There was *slight* growth, but really not a whole lot. I appreciated her finally making it through the revolving door though lol, which I understand is supposed to be symbolic, but looking at the drama as a whole, it unfortunately didn't really end up symbolizing much character growth.

As for good things, literally everything else. Music was awesome, the appearance of whales every now and then, the script, the casting. I loved all the side characters! Character growth for Min-woo was satisfying to see, especially considering how gray he was in many of the early episodes. You could never tell if he was a good or bad guy lol! Glad to see him grow into a good guy under Suyeon's awesome influence. You couldn't ask for better wingwomen than Suyeon and Geurami!

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A drama I thoroughly enjoyed watching, and I would recommend it to those who are considering it.

I found each individual case really interesting, as they showed many different perspectives of many different people, which made me think about certain topics within society which I hadn't really thought about before. I also like that it pushed the fact that nobody is perfect, by showing both the good and the bad sides of lots of characters throughout the episodes.

One thing that felt kind of off for me though was the romance between characters. Honestly, I'm not sure if I sensed a huge amount of romantic chemistry between the main leads, and though they did have heart-warming moments, their relationship just didn't feel significant enough. On a similar note, there was another couple who were put together for no good reason; I don't see why they had to push romance onto the two of them, it was completely pointless and didn't really feel right.

The final episode had a lot going on, but I felt that the series was wrapped up nicely (though I have to admit that I haven't given it much thought), and I found I was satisfied with the ending.
Overall, I really liked the drama, and it was well worth my time.

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surprisingly amazing!

*Trigger Warnings/Content Warnings at end of review!

A mini review for this one because this is definitely going to be one of my new favorite k-dramas. I say "surprisingly" amazing because when I first heard about the premise I was worried that they would misrepresent the autism community. I know some parts were pretty stereotypical and not exactly necessary but I think the representation and good feedback that this show has received so far proves that we are moving in the right direction.

I loved the characters and the plot building. I think the last two episodes were a bit rushed and some parts during the cases were unnecessary but overall it was good. I don't know how to feel about a second season but I'm happy that there are so many good reviews for this one. I looked forward to this show every week as it aired and I think I'll rewatch this one again.
If you're looking for a fun and interesting story that has law themes as well as a healthy relationship this one might be for you.
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*TW/CW: This show involves positive messages, positive role models, and diverse representation but also involves difficult topics such as: Violence (domestic violence), suicide (mentions and on-screen), death (on-screen), romance (no sex, only kissing), mild swearing, drinking (generally responsibly), sexual assault (mentions/implied), bullying/harassment (nothing extreme but is mentioned and shown throughout the series), self-harm, and discrimination due to disability.
If any of this makes you uncomfortable please watch with caution.

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